


The Giver

by writerllofllworlds



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Hurt, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Irondad, Pain, Peter loves Tony so much, Post-Infinity War, References to Depression, Sad, This Is Sad, Tony loves this kid so much, spiderson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-13
Updated: 2019-04-01
Packaged: 2019-11-16 11:53:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18093797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writerllofllworlds/pseuds/writerllofllworlds
Summary: A giver will keep on giving and giving and giving until one day they realize that in helping others find what they are looking for, they have lost themselves.Peter was a Giver.





	1. Stained Glass and Phonecalls

**Author's Note:**

> I think the more I watch Homecoming and read about by boi Peter, I fall so much deeper in love with this kid. Pete just loves so BIG, ya know? He loves unconditionally and continually puts his problems and self-hate into a corner to save and help others.  
> So here is some stuff about Peter sacrificing his own well-being for other people- you know, what we fans just love.

His hands were shaking so badly that he nearly dropped his glass. Luckily, right before he had to calm down a potentially freaked out May, he set the milk on his desk and took a long deep breath. Everything hurt. It was all too much. Too much input and not enough output. Everything was too fast and loud and bright even though he was standing still, the apartment was silent, and all the lights were off.

            Some days he was ash again. He couldn’t look at his hands or he would see the way they were already gone. Whisked away in the breeze from the window. The rest of him would follow soon. It always did. He could feel it all the way down to his bones – his death. It came at night, in the silence, when there were no distractions to dissuade his tired mind.

            God – he was so _tired_.

            Another deep breath – in – out – and his fingers stopped disappearing. He could feel the ground again for a few glorious seconds. He chuckled. It was a scratchy sound, dusty and old and exhausted and pained. His bright and loud laughter was saved for others, saved to make others happy. To help them stay grounded.

            Peter raised his eyes and stared at himself in the mirror on his dresser. He would never thank Natasha enough for her lesson on how to perfectly cover bruises, though he used that trick much more on the dark circles under his eyes or the scars on his wrists then he did on the injuries he received on patrols. Without the concealer and highlighter, he looked _dead_. The darkness under his exhausted gaze was haunting and next to it his already pale skin looked translucent. The lines crisscrossing his skin beneath the long-sleeved shirt he was wearing could be neon for how much they stood out against his complexion.

            Peter shook his head. He had to stop this. He needed to talk to somebody about all of it. He needed to cry and scream and rant until there was nothing left. But as soon as he decided that day arrived, someone else was struggling or someone else lost someone or someone else needed Peter Parker: smile and laughter extraordinaire. Other people needed Peter. So he was Peter – the boy who stumbled over his feet to hear Bucky’s snort. The boy who sassed every villain he came across to make Steve grin. The boy who gave out hugs like candy so that Bruce felt less alone. The boy who made brownies with Tony so that he knew he was loved.

            The boy who died every day so that other people he could live.

            Somewhere, Peter wished someone would see past the mask and help him. But he wasn’t brave enough to ask for help, so he didn’t deserve it. Whenever those desperate cries for help surfaced, he would smile wider and ignore the way his heart was screaming.

            Other people had it worse. Besides, he was Spiderman. Spiderman was a hero. Heroes save people. And that’s exactly what Peter would do, even if he sacrificed himself on the way.

            A buzz from his pocket made him jump a foot in the air. Pulling his phone out, he looked at Tony Stark’s face on the screen, eyes rolled up in playful annoyance after Peter had rambled for a solid 23 minutes about the sandwich he had for lunch that day. With a chuckle much livelier than the last, he slid the green accept button and held the device to his ear, fake yawn already escaping his lips. “Good…” he paused to glance at the clock. “Morning, Mr. Stark.”

            Tony’s breaths were choppy. “Heyah, kid.”

            Peter swallowed and cleared his throat. “Are you okay, Mr. Stark? Do you want me to come over?”

            A rattled sigh answered. “I just needed to – to make sure you were…”

            The 17-year-old smiled gently, already moving to grab his keys. Ever since he had become an unofficial official Avenger, Tony had gifted him with Audi so that he could drive out to the Compound without making Happy go insane. “Let me pack a bag real quick. Should be at the Compound by 4:00.”

            The inventor swallowed very audibly. “No, no kid, you stay at home and go back to sleep. I just had to hear you-,”

            “Too late, Mr. Stark.” He laughed softly, scribbling out a note to May. “I’m already heading down to the garage. Besides, Maria needs to get out and about. She’s gathering dust.”

            “No, she is not.” Tony chuckled, the sound warming the teenager all the way to his toes. “You love that car more than food.”

            Peter would have argued but he had to admit that Tony was absolutely right. “You okay if I just go ahead and stay the weekend? I can help you work out some new designs or we can watch movies or something. I know that sometimes moods can last longer than just one nightmare.”

            Tony breathed that fond kind of breath – the one he did when he couldn’t believe Peter existed. “Of course, kiddie. I’d let you stay for the rest of your life if you wanted.”

            “Watch out, Mr. Stark.” He laughed, slinging his backpack over his shoulder after throwing Return of the King into the front pocket. “I might just take you up on that. The food there is free and _good_.”

            And then the mechanic laughed – loud and free and amazing. It was what Peter tried to worm out of him every time they talked. He had gone through so much. Tony deserved to laugh more. “Pizza sound good to you?”

            “Chocolate ice-cream. Come on, you know me better than that.” He stuck his sticky-note note to the kitchenette and locked the door behind him as he headed out. He’d text May when he got there to make sure she didn’t freak out. “Hey, Mr. Stark?”

            “Yeah, Pete?” his affectionate tone caused the kid to smile.

            “I love you.”

            His breath hitched and the tears dripped from his voice as he replied, “Thanks, kid.”

            _I love you too_. Peter heard it. Tony didn’t need to say it. He never had to.

            “I’ll see you in a bit. Have that pizza or I’m turning around and you sure will have to watch Mamma Mia alone.”

            Tony laughed again. “Okay, Petey-Bird. See you soon. Be safe.”

            The 17-year-old chuckled as he entered the garage. “Always am.” Then after a moment’s pause, he added softly, reassuringly, “Go back to sleep, Tony. I’ll be there when you wake up.”

            There were several long seconds of silence. Then, “Okay.”

            Peter smiled fondly and opened his car door. “Bye, Mr. Stark.”

            “Goodnight Pete.” And the call switched off.

            Peter turned the keys in the ignition and switched on Spotify. Taylor Swift filled the car just as the garage door opened and he pressed down on the gas, ignoring the way that his cheeks were wet with tears that still hadn’t dried.

Some days he was ash again, but for Tony, he would piece himself together into stained glass – beautiful and bright and colorful enough to make him smile. For Tony, he would be whole again, even when he had never felt more broken.


	2. Raised Voices and Bullet Holes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony needed time before Peter needed help.   
> Everyone needed anything before Peter needed help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to everyone who commented last chapter! I am going to make this a little series. I'm not sure how many chapters there will be, but yeah. Thanks again!   
> Also, if anyone has any suggestions to hurt our boi Pete more in this story I've set up, feel FREE to message me or leave it in the comments. Peter whump is one of my favorite things to write.   
> Love you guys!

“Don’t you ever do something like that again, do you hear me?” Tony seethed. He could practically see the smoke coming out of his ears. “EVER!”

And then he stormed away, leaving Peter on the brink of tears. Tony had never yelled at him before. Raised his voice and all that, sure, but the pure fury radiating off of him was a very foreign thing to Peter. He had seen in aimed at Steve and Ross and villains, but never once had his hero ever aimed those flaming eyes at him.

Peter was probably going to cry.

The mission had gone swimmingly, in his opinion. The villain – some mutant with a mind manipulation power – had been terrorizing New York by making people turn against each other, kill themselves, sometimes kill other people. It was horrible. So the Avengers had suited up to take the guy down. It took longer than they thought because he had an army of civilians, but they did it. But Peter made the decision to risk his life for Tony. Three guns were turned towards the billionaire, and he had disengaged the suite to help a child, and Peter wasn’t about to let them shoot his pseudo-father figure, that’s just ridiculous. So he jumped in front of them.

Scared the living daylights out of Tony, apparently, and made him furious.

Furious enough to forget the bullets in Peter’s abdomen.

That was fine. He could sew up bullet wounds by himself. he’d been doing it for a while now. It was easier than admitting his failure to his idol. It was easier than being cared for. He didn’t deserve that.

“Peter,” Natasha came up behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “He’ll come around.”

Steve nodded. “Give him some time. He just cares about you, kid.”

Peter quirked up a smile and huffed out a laugh. “Yeah.” He scratched the back of his neck. “Maybe I should skiddaddle for a little while. I still have a crap ton of homework to do for Monday and maybe giving him some space is a good idea.”

Steve’s eyebrow raised. “Are you hurt anywhere?”

Peter chuckled. “Mr. Rogers, this suit is so thin, I guarantee you would see if I was hurt anywhere. Nah, I’m good. A few bruises that’ll fade within the hour and I’ll be good as new.”

He smiled and clapped a hand on the teen’s shoulder. “I thought I told you to call me Steve.”

And he laughed, shrugging his shoulders and saluting them both. He slipped out of the Tower with ease and swung back to Queens without any significant trouble. Literally a block from his apartment, his Spidey Senses perked up and he stopped. Freezing to listen, a small whimpering sound came from the alley below him. The light disappeared beyond the horizon as he hopped down towards the scared noise.

Immediately, he grew angry. Three men towered over a little boy, muttering about _raping_ him.

“Hey, perverts!” he yelled. They jumped and turned, guns raised. “Pick on someone your own size, yeah?”

Shots fired, and Peter dodged. “Oh, man, with faces like that, it’s no wonder you have to prey on little kids!” He webbed the first guy up without a hitch. He was soon followed by the second guy.

A searing pain ripped through his hip as the bullet exited the other side of his leg. He barely contained his scream to a pained yelp as he slammed into the apartment wall. Blood was left on the brick as he stood and turned to return the attack. With a quick flick of his wrist, the last attacker was up on the wall with his posse. The little boy was sobbing when Peter fell to the ground beside him, ignoring the awful feeling that ran up his leg.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay. They can’t hurt you now.”

He looked up at Peter, big blue eyes wide and terrified. “Spiderman.”

“Yeah!” he nodded, hoping that the kid wasn’t good at reading faces behind masks. The grimace he had on would have scared the boy even more. “Yeah, that’s me. How about we get you home, yeah? Where-?”

He was assaulted by a hug as the little kid threw himself into Peter’s arms. Immediately, he curled himself around the child to provide some comfort. Some safety from the terror he had just felt.

Peter’s breath caught at the picture he created. This was what he needed. This was what he wanted. Comfort. Someone to tell him it was okay. That he would be okay.

But Peter was the hero. Hero’s didn’t get saving.

So he held the kid tighter and helped him stand when Peter was falling deeper and deeper into a put he could never get out of.

“Come on, Bud. Let’s get you home.”

By the time Peter stumbled into his apartment that night, May had long since left for work and the only greeting he got was silence. Blood clung to his body as he took his suit off. Three bullets. Two from the civilians that morning, and one in the alley. He pulled out the supplies Natasha had given him when she taught him field medicine and sat on his bed.

Tears made stitching hard work, but he did it.

Part of him wanted to scream and be angry, but what would that do? What would his anger solve? Last time he got angry, Tony took his suit away. All he did was save Tony’s life!

Tony needed time. Peter had accidentally hurt him, scared him.

He would give Tony as much time as he needed for him to love Peter again.

So even when he was sobbing on his bed, bloodstained everything on the blanket around him, he didn’t call. He couldn’t. Tony needed time more than Peter needed help.

Everyone needed anything before Peter needed help.

Sometimes he wished he didn’t have a healing factor. Sometimes he wished the bullets – or the knives or spears or magic – didn’t miss. Wished they hit where they were intended too, and he could just _stop_.

But people needed Peter. Tony needed Peter.

So Peter sewed up his bullet wounds and bandaged them. The razor on his sink remained unused for tonight. He already had to wash enough blood off his hands.


	3. Just Some Tired Kids

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter hummed in agreement. They sat comfortably for a moment in silence before Peter asked, “What brought you up here to jump?”
> 
> “I’m tired.” She whispered.
> 
> He didn’t know why, but that little confession almost brought him to tears. How many times had he done this? How many times had he stood on top of the Empire State Building and sobbed until he couldn’t breathe because he was tired? How many scars had he made because he was tired?
> 
> “Me too.” He breathed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't own Marvel.  
> Here's more Peter whump.  
> The girl in this one is actually from personal experience. Bit of a vent for me, this chapter.  
> Yeah. Thanks.

He found the kid standing on the top of a building on a stormy night, one foot dangerously perched over the edge of Wallstreet.

“Hey, I’m sure your face is much prettier now than as a sidewalk pancake.”

The girl turned around so quickly she almost fell. Peter reached out to stable her and nearly choked. This kid couldn’t be older than fourteen. She was tiny and had big green eyes, made greener by her tears. As he glanced over her, his heart fell to his feet. Mismatched scars adorned her arms, white against her dark skin.

“S-Spiderman?” she asked weakly.

Peter forced himself to find his voice. “Y-Yeah. That’s me! What are you doing up here?”

She stared at him. “Falling.”

His breath caught. “Hey, hey, why don’t you come over here away from the edge and we can talk about it?” _please_.

She shook her head.

“Okay, okay.” Peter shook his head. “You can stay there, that’s fine. Do – do you mind if I join you?”

She didn’t say no, so he walked over and sat next to her. She stared down at the street below.

“What’s your name?” he asked. Anything to keep her talking. Talking wasn’t jumping.

“Jo.” She whispered.

“That’s a cool name.” He smiled. “How old are you, Jo?”

“I’m fourteen.” She replied softly.

So he was right. “Oof. I remember fourteen. Rough year.”

She didn’t respond. The breeze moved her hair around her face, pulling her down it seemed.

“I’m seventeen.” He continued, and she looked up at him finally.

Her brows furrowed. “You’re just a kid?”

Peter laughed. Just a kid. Yeah, he was just a kid. That’s what Mr. Stark would say when he did something cool.

_“Just a kid and you can do this? Just you wait, Pete! You’ll be the best of us!”_

Or when Mr. Rogers clapped him on the back after Peter beat him in sparring practice. “ _Peter, you just beat Captain America and you’re just a kid. Think of what you’ll do when you’re my age_!”

Or when Peter was alone on the bathroom floor with nightmares of Skip Westcott his only company as he mourned the fact that he was just a kid.

“Yeah, I’m just a kid.” He nodded. He took a deep breath and with only a second’s hesitation, he lifted up his mask and said, “My name’s Peter.”

She gasped. “You _are_ a kid!”

He scoffed. “You thought I was lying to you?”

“Sir, this is the 21st century. Guys will say weird things to get girls to trust them.”

Peter’s eyes shot wide at the gravity of her statement. “Well, you’ve got me there, Jo. Man, deep for fourteen, don’t you think?”

Jo shrugged sadly. “I’ve had pepper spray in my backpack since I was ten. Talking about sexual predators isn’t really that big of a deal for fourteen.”

Peter hummed in agreement. They sat comfortably for a moment in silence before Peter asked, “What brought you up here to jump?”

“I’m tired.” She whispered.

He didn’t know why, but that little confession almost brought him to tears. How many times had he done this? How many times had he stood on top of the Empire State Building and sobbed until he couldn’t breathe because he was tired? How many scars had he made because he was tired?

“Me too.” He breathed.

Jo glanced at him, the tear falling down her cheek illuminated by the city lights. “Really?”

Peter swallowed. “Yeah.”

“I don’t want to be alive sometimes.” She said matter-of-factly.

“Me neither.” He agreed. Right now, actually, Always. It was a state of being at this point.

“I’m just _sad_ ,” she croaked. “ _All the time_ , and it never stops. Like, I can be happy. I’m usually happy. But there’s – there’s this undercurrent of just sadness that won’t go away. It’s always there and I’ll be sitting in my room crying over nothing. I just feel so sad.”

Peter blinked the tears away and nodded. “You know, Jo, that sounds a lot like a symptom of depression. Have you -,”

“My mom doesn’t believe that depression exists.” She said weakly. Peter closed his eyes in pain. “I’ve tried to talk to her about it, and counseling. Because if there’s a way to help me get better, then I should do it, right?”

Peter knew he wasn’t supposed to answer the question. She was asking it to the wind. He knew that. He had done that a million times.

“But she says it’s just a teenage thing.” Jo sobbed. “It’s just a phase and I’ll get over it. But it hurts that I can’t be what everyone wants or what everyone needs me to be. And it hurts worse that I can’t be what I need or want and I’m so exhausted of feeling so empty and so overwhelmed all at once; I just want it to _stop_!”

The last word propelled her forward and Peter grabbed her to keep her from falling off the ledge. He pulled her into his arms and rubbed her back and stroked her hair. He rocked her back and forth, making sure that his tears were silent. Her body wracked with her sobs, and she wailed with pain beyond her years.

“I know,” he whispered. “I know.”

“I don’t know what to do.” She croaked.

Peter let out a shaky breath. “I know that everything seems awful right now. Believe me, I get it. But it gets better, Jo. Do you know how I know?”

She didn’t say anything.

“Because I’m seventeen, and I was where you are,” am where you are. “and I’m still here. I couldn’t jump because people need me. People needed me to help them.”

“But I’m not a hero.” She moaned.

Peter’s heart shattered. “What? Of course you are! Jo, you have no idea the people you could be saving every day. Your mom? I’m sure she loves you and she’s just scared because you’re her baby and she doesn’t know how to fix this. I’m sure that you save her every time you smile or laugh or do anything with her. I’m sure your friends are saved by you all the time. Jo, you never know who could be falling in love with your smile.”

“But I feel so broken.” She sighed.

“I know,” Peter said. “So do I. But does that make me any less a hero?”

She smiled sadly. “No.”

“Well, then there you go.” He pushed down the overwhelming ache in his chest to flash a grin. “It’s okay to feel sad, Jo.”

Something about that sentence made her begin to cry again, and he held her.

She fell asleep against him, tears still wet on her face. He scooped her up and pulled down his mask. He walked back down the roof door into the building. His hearing was quick to pick up a woman yelling Jo’s name and he carried the girl to the right apartment. The woman was obviously Jo’s mother and as soon as she saw Peter with her daughter she sobbed. Two policemen stood at her door, and their shoulders fell with relief once they saw the kid. She must have called them to report her missing.

“Joanne! Jo! My babygirl, sweetheart…!” he passed the girl to her mother’s arms. “What happened to her?”

“She was on the roof, ma’am,” Peter said, firm but soft.

Her eyes, green like her daughter’s, widened to a horrified size.

“If I hadn’t stopped her,” he swallowed. “She probably would have jumped.”

Her mother sobbed.

“I would suggest taking your daughter to get counseling. She needs someone to talk to. Jo desperately wants someone to help her get better.”

The woman couldn’t reply with words but she nodded and carried Jo into the apartment. The policemen nodded to Peter and followed her inside. He took that as his cue to leave.

Peter wandered back to his own apartment. May was out. She always seemed to be out nowadays. He crawled out onto his own roof and sat on the ledge. No suit, just Peter.

Just a kid.

Peter cleared his throat, but no manner of coping was going to stop the tears. Jo had the worst kind of sadness. The kind where you couldn’t explain why you were said. That was a killer. It ate away at you until you couldn’t _breathe,_ and you were left with nothing but yourself and the mess that you are. Peter wondered if that was why he didn’t talk to Tony, or Steve, or May, or Tasha or any of them. Perhaps it was just so hard to explain. Perhaps he was scared like Jo – that being just a kid meant that the grownups wouldn’t believe him.

Peter was such a hypocrite. He always told people to hold on. He said that things got better, there was a light at the end of the tunnel, you never know who could be falling in love with your smile. And yet –

He was the one who wanted to jump.

Peter began to cry. He pulled his knees up to his chest as the rain began to fall from the sky. He wanted to be enough. He wanted to be what people wanted. He wanted to be what people needed. He wanted to be what he wanted and needed. But he never was. He was never enough and he was so goddamn _tired_.

And it was sad. It was all so sad. Because Peter was crying just because he was Peter.

And it was sad, because maybe Peter was the problem.

The rain didn’t stop all night. Peter would know. He didn’t leave that roof.


	4. Sleepless Nights and Haunted Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve had a habit of not sleeping.  
> So did Peter, as it turned out, and what better did the teen have to do than join his super-soldier friend.

            Steve had a habit of not sleeping.

            So did Peter, as it turned out, and what better did the teen have to do than join his super-soldier friend.

            It was a Saturday night as Peter crawled through his bedroom window at the Tower.

            “Good evening, Peter.”

            The boy chuckled. “Long as you don’t tell Tony it’s a good evening to you too, Friday.”

            The AI didn’t reply, and Peter took that as consent to his request. He shimmied into a clean t-shirt and shorts and turned to his bed. Images of the past three nights’ nightmares haunted the back of his eyelids. Swallowing down the fear crawling up his throat and the panic attack scrambling for his heart, he let out a shaky breath. Shaking his head and wiping his eyes, he grabbed a granola bar out of his stash and silencing his patrol alarm right before it went off. Tony preferred if he was home before one in the morning; most of the time he did, sometimes he didn’t. Tonight, however, had been a quiet night, and anything that Peter didn’t have time to handle the police would.  

            Laughing quietly to himself, he snatched up his backpack and strolled down to the kitchen for a bigger snack and maybe to steal Clint’s cookies as he did his homework. The training room was just outside the common floor’s kitchen (supers tended to be hungry after working out for hours on end), and as he rounded the corner to his favorite spot at the counter, Steve Rogers came into view.

            It wasn’t weird to see an Avenger training in the wee hours of the morning. Nightmares, PTSD, and trauma to last a lifetime haunted each and every one of them from war to abusive parents. Natasha was up the most. She and Peter sometimes had tea together when neither could sleep and she would sing to him in Russian.

            They all had their demons. Some wore the faces of people they’d loved. Some wore the masks of monsters that they were still fighting.

Being a hero meant that you were able to overcome those demons and stand up again, spandex suit or no.

            So when Peter saw the Captain, he wasn’t surprised at all. Saddened, yes, but not surprised.

            He swiped an apple from the kitchenette and opened his computer. Turning his phone on silent, he started typing away at his history assignment; Twentieth century Russia was a bitch.

            Just as Stalin died in his textbook thirty minutes later, Steve made his way out of the training area. “Pete!”

            The young hero looked up. “Cap?”

            “I didn’t know you were there, is all.” He smiled fondly, going to refill his water bottle. “What are you up to?”

            “Twentieth century Russia.”

            Steve cringed. “Yeah, Russia was something else. We didn’t know anything about Stalin and the revolutions until afterward. During the war though, I met two Russian soldiers who had fought in the first war, and they had tales to tell.”

            “There’s a unique history lesson.” Peter chuckled. “What did they say?”

            Cap always loved when he asked to be told stories. “Well, one of them had escaped Siberia with his family. His wife and daughters were in England with their cousins. He had joined the Allies to fight. Good man.”

            Peter grinned. “You should write history books, Cap.”

            The old soldier smiled as his gaze became distant. The young hero studied him in reverent silence. Tony was the Avenger that Peter was closest to (the _person_ Peter was closest to), but Steve had always been only a few steps behind. There was something about the similarities between the two that had drawn them together. After the war with Thanos ended and the dusted people returned, Peter had a few choice words with the captain about his treatment of Mr. Stark. After that, Steve had grown ever fonder of the arachnid, watching out for him and caring for him like some super cool uncle. They were great partners when it came to the job and bonded over their mutual (and hilarious) Gen Z humor, which left the rest of the Avengers slightly unnerved. He was like a super cool uncle.

            He was a lot like Ben.

            “Cap?”

            He didn’t answer for a moment, too caught up in his memories. “Hmm?”

            “Why are you up so late?”

            The blue eyes turned away. “Buck’s on a mission.”

            Sergeant Barnes and Cap were inseparable. It was fairly obvious after Bucky returned from the snap that they were in love with each other. If everything they had gone through had taught them anything, it was that life was short and they needed to tell each other what they really felt.

            It was something they all had felt.

            Peter nodded in understanding. “Natasha and Wanda are with him.”

            Steve nodded, his throat tight. That wasn’t comforting enough. Not when someone you loved could be in danger.

            “Are you worried about him?”  he asked.

            Steve looked back at him, eyes crinkled by a sad smile. The moon glinted off the tears there. “Yeah.”

            “You know, my Uncle Ben was a police officer.” The seventeen-year-old glanced away towards the moon. it was seldom that they saw the moon with all the light pollution in New York. A welcome light in all the darkness. “Lots of the time he had to go on dangerous missions. Lots of the time there was a big chance he wouldn’t come home. He never told me the stories, but May talks about them sometimes. He wasn’t fighting giant purple aliens, but he held a lot of people who had killed themselves as they waited for the first responders.” Peter was surprised that he wasn’t crying. Perhaps it was because he was helping someone else by talking about his uncle. Perhaps it was because he had trained himself not to. “Had to break into hostage situations, went undercover a few times. It was scary, waiting for him to come home. But no matter where he was going or for how long, he always came to my bedroom the night before he left.”

             Peter looked back at the hero next to him, so like his uncle in heart. Kind, just, brave. Steve looked at him with tears on his cheeks and empathy in his gaze. Peter smiled and lowered his voice to a whisper as if telling the captain a secret.

             “He’d come to my room and kneel down next to me to tuck me in. He’d always say, ‘Hey, Pete, you know I love you, right?’ and I’d always answer say ‘Yes,’ all small and sad that he was leaving again.” He sighed, looking away again. “And he’d hold my cheeks and tell me ‘Pete, my Peter, do not forget how brave you are, okay?’ ‘I’m not braver than you,’ I’d tell him. He would laugh and kiss my forehead. ‘Pete, you’re the bravest person I know.’ He would hug be really tight like he didn’t want me to forget what hugging him felt like, and he would tell me to be good for May. Then he would always say in this really soft voice, ‘I love you, Pete. And don’t you forget it.’”

              The teenager huffed a silent laugh. “He wanted to make sure I knew before he left, just in case.”

              “He sounds like a good man,” Steve whispered.

              “The best.” Peter nodded. _And I killed him_. “You and he would have gotten along really well.”

              He met the captain’s eyes again. “Did you tell Bucky what you needed to before he left? Just in case?”

              Steve nodded. “Yeah.”

              “Then he knows.” Peter reassured him. “You can’t control what happens out there, Steve, but you can control whether or not he knows how much you love him. You just have to be brave, is all.”

              Steve shook his head, looking at him like he didn’t quite believe Peter existed. Mr. Stark had that look a lot. “How did you get so smart, Peter?”

              Peter snickered. “It’s the trauma.”

             That earned him a harmless slap to the back of the head. “You know, I think a lot of us see you as just a kid sometimes.”

             “Yeah, I know.”

             “But you know more than some of us would ever believe,” Steve said sincerely. “I’m sorry for that, you know. For taking you for granted.”

             The young hero looked at the soldier next to him. He knew that he was small, naïve, stupid. He knew that he talked too much during battles, knew that the Avengers thought that was reckless and annoying. He knew that his cheerful and optimistic demeanor looked to them very childish. He knew that they still saw him as a liability sometimes, as nothing more than another kid trying to fight a man’s war.

             That was alright. It was nothing next to what Peter thought of himself.

             “It’s okay, Cap.” Peter grinned. “If people’s doubtful words made me stop being me, then I guarantee you I wouldn’t be here. Have you seen the Bugle?”

             Steve’s eyes lit up with laughter. “Oh, wow. They’re awful!”

            “Yeah!” Pete gestured with his hands. “I literally save the city and get cats down from trees! And _I’m_ a menace!”

             The war hero erupted in laughter. “Did Tony tell you that he thought about buying out the company just to make them stop?”

             His mouth fell open. “No.”

             “Yep.” Steve nodded. “He was so angry about that article a few months ago after the snap had been reversed-,”

             “And Jamison said he wished I hadn’t come back?” Peter snorted. _Me too, me too, me too_. “Man, that was harsh!”

            “He was livid, let me tell you. Nearly flew down there in his suit to kill Jamison on his own. I feel bad for whatever villain ever tries to kill you, Pete. Tony will roast their asses.”

            Peter chuckled. “Yeah, he’s a protective dad like that.”

            They fell into a comfortable silence as Steve finished his water.

            “I think I’ll head back to bed, Pete.” He broke the quiet.

            “Good,” he replied. “God knows how much sleep an old guy like you needs.”

            He dodged a water bottle and sniggered.

            Steve shook his head but said, “Really though, thank you, Peter.”

            Peter nodded. “Anytime, Cap.”

            Just before Steve rounded the corner into the hallway, Peter called after him. “Hey, Steve!”

            “Yeah, kid?”

            He swallowed, hoping his eyes conveyed his empathy. “If you ever want to tell more stories, I’d be more than happy to listen.”

            The war hero looked at him as if he were something else. “Thanks, kiddo.” And he was gone. Peter let out a staggering breath, the wall he had been holding up falling to the ground. His hands shook furiously as he tried to calm his raging heart to a dull beat. Images of Ben’s broken body flashed across his vision in vivid detail. The panic attack that had been waiting in silence since he had crawled through that window was surging through him like a hurricane.

             “Get it together, Peter. _Get it together_!” 

             Tony would hate him right now. He would hate that he was covering this up.

             That night he dreamt of Ben’s blood on his hands and his voice in his ear.

_You know I love you right_?


	5. That's How the Light Gets In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The supervillain causes it all.   
> A fallout, confessions, and heartache all out in the open.  
> If he jumps, will someone catch him?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS IS THE LAST CHAPTER  
> Thank you guys so much for following me writing this thing! You all have been so supportive and encouraging on my awful WHUMP habit - I thank you.   
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy! 
> 
>  
> 
> I love Tony being irondad. It's the BEST.
> 
> References to suicidal thoughts and tendencies, as well as references to past sexual abuse. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

It was the villain that did it.

Peter knew that it would all come crumbling down eventually. Even though he deluded himself into thinking he could keep up this façade forever, deep down he knew it would have a breaking point. Sometime he was going to do it. He was going to jump.

Whether he let himself be caught, well, heroes don’t need saving, do they?

Not him. Not the ones that don’t deserve it.

Peter often wondered how other people saw him. Obviously, they didn’t see him as he did. If they could they wouldn’t want him alive either. Peter often wondered if that feeling deep in his chest was what Tony meant when he talked about depression. The brokenness that isn’t just a feeling but a physical weight that is so much more than mere sadness. Peter often wondered if he could equate himself to a candle: he burned himself out to give other people light.

Smoke was still floating off of his wick that day as he slipped on his suit. Three hours of coaxing retired assassins out of panic attacks were exhausting, especially since Peter had already had to do the same to himself twice that morning. The alarm on his watch beeped just as he had gotten Bucky laughing again.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I tripped okay? I didn’t know the banana was there!”

You would never have guessed James Buchanan Barnes was a cold-blooded killer only four years before from the sound of his wonderful laugh.

“Oh,” Peter huffed, touching the screen on his wrist. “Duty calls, Mr. Barnes! I’ll see you tomorrow! Be ready to get your butt kicked at Mario Cart.”

His brown eyes crinkled. “Pete?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re a good kid, you know that right?”

Peter blinked, the smile slipping off his face as the words settled in his brain. No, he wasn’t. Peter wasn’t a kid. He was a skeleton with skin. He wasn’t human anymore. There was nothing in him – he didn’t have anything left. Everything was gone. He felt to empty yet so overwhelmed all the time. It was like two different people were warring for dominance and both were killing each other. Both were holding out poisons for Peter to drink and both of his hands were reaching.

Peter often wondered how many other people woke up every morning hoping that day would be the day. The day it _all just stopped_.

“Thanks, Sergeant.” He breathed.

Bucky smiled fondly. “No problem, kiddo. Be safe out there.”

“Will do!” he winked right before he pulled his mask over his face. Immediately, Karen’s voice buzzed to life in his ears.

“Good afternoon Peter. Mr. Stark has already sent you the coordinates to the mission. Ten minutes if you hurry.”

“No chance for a stop for ice-cream, huh?” Peter quipped as he swung out his window into the busy streets of Queens.

“Mr. Stark has already said he’ll treat you afterward.”

He supposed that was a small victory and proceeded to the route Karen had planned out for him. He could see the smoke rising from the fight before he got there. It twisted into the cloudy New York sky like a black dragon. Perfect atmosphere to fight a supervillain.

He didn’t even get to officially join the fight with a funny pun or dramatic entrance. As soon as he swung around the Empire State Building, his Spidey Sense went off like crazy. Not fast enough, however. Strange purple mist shot him right in the face and suddenly he was falling. His vision had disappeared. His entire body was enveloped by this suffocating fog. It swept into his nostrils and mouth, taking his breath and shoving it back down his throat.

Okay. This was how he died then. Nice. Peter personally would have preferred jumping in front of someone to save them from a bullet or something, but whatever. When you gotta go you gotta go, right?

 

 

“PETER!”

Tony. That was Tony’s voice.

There was one thing that Peter hated most about himself. not all of him wanted to die. There was always that part of Peter that still fought. Peter sometimes wanted it to go away. But maybe that’s why it demanded on staying. The part of Peter that would never give up. It would put away the razor right before he hit that vein. It would make him flick his wrist right before he hit the pavement. It made him run to Tony’s workshop when the nightmares came so that he didn’t do anything stupid. It was the part of him that wanted Peter to help himself as much as he helped others.

It was the one that kick-started his body back into action.

Peter’s eyes popped open (when had he closed them?) and he immediately snapped his wrist. His webs attached to something and suddenly he was flying out of the smoke. Rain hit his face and he took a giant gulp of air. So it had started raining. Lovely.

“PETER!” Tony’s voice nearly shattered his eardrum. The gold and red suit was nearly at him where he clung to the glass windows of some skyscraper he wasn’t aware of enough to name. “PETER! ARE YOU ALRIGHT?”

His throat was too busy trying to restock its air supply for him to answer.

“Kiddo? Kiddo, please talk to me. She was the last one you hit. Everyone else is here too, and we’re going to find a way out of this hellhole, but you gotta talk to me kiddo.”

Peter coughed, rolling onto his back ( _when had he fallen??_ ) and opening his eyes again. “W-what?”

“Oh, thank God.” Tony’s relieved voice would have been comforting if Peter hadn’t realized the sky was red.

“What the fuck?!” Peter shot upright too quickly, but he ignored his pounding head to stare at his surroundings. The sky was red and raining red rain (not blood, not blood, not blood). The “skyscraper” he had been attached to was a wall that crumbled before his very eyes. The ground beneath them was dusty (not dust, not dust, not dust, breathe goddammit!) and brown, like clay. The other Avengers surrounded him, either trying to grapple with their situation as well or already on their feet fighting some humanoid figure in the distance. “Whe – where are we?”

“Are you hurt? Can you breathe?” Tony lifted Peter’s mask to run his hand through the curls there. It calmed both of them down. “Spiderbaby?”

The endearment didn’t do anything to help Peter’s mood. “Mr. Stark, where _are_ we?”

The inventor’s startling gaze roamed his kid’s for a moment before answering. “We don’t really know. All we know is that that purple crap teleported us to this fucking shitty desert.” He sounded angry. Peter knew that he hated not knowing things.

“Headcount?” The vigilante pushed himself up. He stood up with Tony’s help.

“Steve, Natasha, Thor, Clint, Wanda, Sam, Rhodey, and me. And you, I guess. I would try and convince you to sit this one out seeing as I wouldn’t have called you if I knew how dangerous this was, but I know you won’t listen to me.”

Peter glared. “I can help.”

Tony’s angry stare softened. “I know, kiddie, but I don’t want you here. I want you home and safe. I don’t … Titan was hell, bud. I can’t have a repeat.”

“It’s not Thanos, Mr. Stark, I think we can beat it.”

            The billionaire’s lips tilted upwards. “Just be careful, bud. I have enough heart problems.”

            “Oh, you love me.” Peter winked, putting his mask back on and switching on the open commlink.

            Tony rolled his eyes, face-plate sliding back down. “Yeah, yeah, keep dreaming kid.”

            Peter often wondered if other people begged to be loved without words like he did. He often wondered if the Avengers understood when he said things like that – if they heard the screams of help and pleading for affection. If they did, well, then they were assholes. If they didn’t, well, neither did anyone else, so he couldn’t blame them.

            He shook his head and followed Tony as he ran to join the others, pushing his emotional filing cabinet back in its dark corner. When he returned home he’d unload. For now, there were people who needed saving.

            “Nice of you to join us, Spidey.” Clint high-fived him as he sidled up next to the archer. “How was the Physics exam?”

            “Long, but easy.” Peter shrugged. “At least, I think it was easy. Either that or I did everything horribly wrong and I’m failing junior year.”

            He laughed and punched his arm playfully. “Oh, shut up, _Einstein_.”

            Clint didn’t see the way Peter tensed for a moment, so it was fine. The teenager forced himself to remain calm and ignore the images and phantom pains, shaking his head to focus on the more pressing matter – a supervillain.

            “So what’s this guy’s shtick?” Peter inquired as Wanda tried to contain the purple mist with her magic. “He some sort of magician who didn’t get enough stage love?”

            “He’s a kid.” Steve ran up to them, face bloody and multiple bruises lining his jaw.

            Peter’s stomach dropped. “What?”

            “He can’t be older than twenty. Mutant, I think, and if I’m right then he’s just discovered his powers and doesn’t really know how to control them. He probably doesn’t want to hurt innocent people, hence the strange alternate universe we’re in now.” The captain paused for a breath, wiping his bleeding nose. “He has something against the Avengers-,”

            “Well he’ll have to take a number and wait his turn,” Peter muttered. “Loki has his regularly scheduled hissy fit next Monday.”

            “- and probably wants to kill us. But he’s young, impressionable. I wouldn’t be too surprised if he’s been told we’re at fault for a tragedy and is here to seek revenge.”

            “So the same old Thursday special.” Tony groaned. “Any special sides with this dish, Cap?”

            The soldier’s lip quirked up at his teammates’ jabs. “Well, the whole purple mist is new.”

            The Iron Man mask’s design didn’t have personality, but everyone knew what Tony’s face looked like beneath it. “True. It’s a nice change from the normal machine guns and hired secret agents. Refreshing.”

            “Yeah, get me some flipping swim trunks and a snorkel.” Peter huffed impatiently, crossing his arms. “Maybe there’s some lava pool around here somewhere I can take a relaxing dunk in. how are we taking this guy down, Steve?”

            Cap always appreciated Peter’s ability to get down to business when it mattered. “I saw we try the old attack him from all sides until we wear him out. It worked on Thanos.”

            “The _third_ time we tried it.” Clint reminded him.

            “Third times the charm.” Peter shrugged. “I’m with Cap though. especially if this guy is inexperienced and scared, he’s much more likely to tire quicker. We can beat him and still have time for that ice-cream I’ve been promised.”

            Steve grinned at him while Clint shot an offended glare at Tony. “You give him ice-cream?”

            “What can I say?” The Iron Man suit shrugged its shoulders. “He gives me those puppy dog eyes and I just can’t refuse.”

            “Didn’t work on those airpods.” Peter smirked.

            “Shut it you little shit.” But Peter could feel the concerned grip that Tony had on his shoulder as they went to join their teammates.

            Thor, Sam, and Rhodey were all flying above the purple dude and trying to keep him distracted from the people on the ground. Lightning was raining from the blood-soaked sky to add to that lovely apocalypse aesthetic and both Rhodey and Sam were dark silhouettes against the churning red storm clouds above them. Wanda was being helped up by Natasha; Clint sprinted to help them. Tony shot into the air to assist the airstrike. Steve and Peter stayed on the ground to help where they could.

            Commands and snarky comments were exchanged via commlink, and Peter’s pit of sorrow that he had fallen in that morning started to ebb. Even in such a dire and dangerous situation, he couldn’t help but feel more alive than he had in ages. Team missions always made him feel wanted. He could help here. Spiderman could help.

            Peter Parker wasn’t worth much, but Spiderman? He was a hero.

            He would much rather be Spiderman than Peter.

            They hit the forty-five-minute mark and the villain finally started to begin to show signs of fatigue. Peter had assessed the dirtbag as he fought him. He could shift his body to become mist and teleport here and there. Also, if he concentrated all the mist at one person, it could leave them on the ground for minutes at a time. He wasn’t exactly sure what happened when it hit them since he hadn’t been hit himself yet, but he thought he had seen Steve crying after being hit the third time. He had screamed something that sounded like “Bucky.”

            But Sergeant Barnes wasn’t there.

            However, the guy didn’t have complete control (or much of any control really) and suddenly the mist wasn’t a mist. It was a hurricane of purple and black and terror that rolled out from the man, sweeping over all of them.

            Every hero flew into the air or fell from the sky.

            All but Peter.

            Peter hadn’t moved. He didn’t know why. The mist had hit him, but nothing had happened.

            Kurogiri popped into Peter’s head and he was about to make a comment about how stupidly similar the villains were, but then Tony started screaming his name. Suddenly his friend’s were all screaming. In pain or horror, each was beseeching another to come back, to stay safe, to not be dead. It was him, Bucky, Loki. All the loved ones that could still be lost.

            Peter whirled back to glare at the villain. “You show them their worst nightmares, don’t you?”

            The man blinked, purple eyes widened in surprise. “Smart kid.”

            “Kid?” Peter snarled, feet sliding into a defensive stance. “I’m barely three years younger than you, if that.”

            “You’re fifteen?” the guy’s voice crumbled a bit, losing the bravado that had been omnipresent throughout the fight.

            Peter’s heart stopped for a moment. “You’re _eighteen_ years old?”

            That was different. He was a year older than Peter. Barely an adult. _God_.

            “Why- why are you doing this?”

            Purple-eyes shook his head. “You wouldn’t understand. You’re a kid.”

            Oh, Peter hated when people said that. He loathed that phrase. There were so many things that he shouldn’t have to understand for that very reason, but he did. He knew what it was like to bury his parents, his uncle, to risk his life every day to save other people. He knew the hardships of money and time and depression. Oh, kid he was. That didn’t mean he didn’t understand.

            “Alright, Senor Grape.” He began. “I’m not an idiot, okay? I’ve seen some deep shit.”

            “The Avengers are the reason my mom is dead!” he yelled, the mist once again circling around him like lions ready to pounce. “They kill hundreds of innocent people and the world celebrates them as heroes!”

            “Listen, man, I know that losing people is-,”

            “My little sister committed suicide because of them!” the man – kid. He really was still a kid. Eighteen wasn’t a man yet. Hell, he still had baby fat. “When my mom died, my dad started drinking. He started to assault my sister until she shot herself in the head!”

            Peter’s breath caught. “I’m so sorry that happened to-,”

            “NO!” He screeched, hands thrown to the sides. The purple mist rolled over Peter again but had no effect. “You’re just like them! Selfish, arrogant, a _monster_! MURDERER!”

            Ben’s blood. It was on Peter’s hands again. The warehouse dust was falling in his eyes. His feet were crumbling to dust.

            “I WANT YOU DEAD!”

            _Me too, man._

 _Me too_.

 

 

            And yet, that stubborn part of Peter breathed. “No.”

            The man’s eyes were practically on fire with the amount of fury emanating from them. “ _What_?”

            “I get it.” Peter nodded. “Trust me, I really do. I get the whole revenge thing and the anger. I get the pain, man. I feel you.”

“You know nothing about what I feel!” he shrieked. His eyes glowed that awful purple color and his Peter’s gut churned.

“You think I don’t understand?!” Peter screeched. Suddenly, he snatched the mask off his head. His own eyes aflame, Peter stepped forward. His stomach was boiling with everything he had been feeling for the past two years – fuck that. The past thirteen. Everything since he was four and he realized he would never see his parents again. All of the pain and torture and heartbreak that lived in Peter’s shadow, that existed to make him suffer. That dragged him into an abyss that he could never climb out of and left him bloody and broken. The growing sadness that dug its dark talons into his soul and left him as an empty shell, a memory of the boy before the snap. Skip’s ever present figure in his nightmares and on his hips. The bruises that only Peter could see. The scars that his rapist had left behind. The blood that never left Peter’s hands as he screamed UNCLE BEN until his throat was raw. The fear that had sewn itself into his very being, leaving him shaking and alone.

The idea that had started God knew when – Peter wasn’t worth anything.

But he would be _damned_ if he let other people feel what he was feeling.

“You think I don’t _get_ it?!” his cheeks burned with the tears of fury rolling across his skin. “You think I don’t know what you’re feeling?! Trust me, dude, I do. I get it.”

“YOU CAN’T POSSIBLY UNDER-!”

“My parents were killed in a plane crash when I was four years old.” Somehow, Peter’s voice, so soft compared to his adversary’s, silenced him. “I don’t have any siblings. It was just me. My aunt and uncle couldn’t afford therapy, so I had to learn to cope with the fact that I will never see my parents again on my own, and at the ripe old age of four no less.”

Around him, the screaming was stopping. Good. He was distracting Senor Grape enough that the mist’s power was fading from his teammates.

“THE AVENGERS-!”

“When I was fourteen, I got superpowers, but I was so scared of people seeing me as the monster I thought I was that I didn’t try to get any help. I was terrified of what I was becoming and one night I ran.” Peter couldn’t stop the tears that began to cloud the edges of his vision. “My uncle Ben was shot and killed trying to find me. I spent months trying to find the man who had done it so that I could get revenge, but I didn’t realize that the person I wanted to blame was me! It was my fault my uncle died!”

There was a gasp, and if Peter didn’t have his mind on other things, he would have realized that it was Wanda. “I hate myself for that every single damn day of my life. I see his blood on my hands all the time! You see your sister’s, don’t you? Or your mom’s? It’s there because you blame yourself, but you see the Avengers as easy targets to blame. Guess what, buddy? It wasn’t there fault!”

“THEY-!”

“It wasn’t yours either!” Peter stopped suddenly.

It wasn’t yours either.

 _Peter_.

 _It wasn’t your **fault**_.

A sob billowed up in his throat. “It- it wasn’t our faults! It wasn’t theirs either! People die, dude. Bad things happen to good people! That’s just how life works!”

“IRON MAN ALONE-!”

Oh no. Oh **_fuck_** no. “IRON MAN IS THE ONLY REASON I’M STILL ALIVE!”

Silence settled over the battlefield. Peter was livid. Tony was the single greatest person that he had ever met. Someone so good and kind and forgiving wasn’t possible and yet there he was, looking at Peter across the brown dust, eyes wet and tears streaming down his face. Senor Grape could drag other people through the mud, but Peter wouldn’t let him drag Tony. Not today. Not ever.

“I don’t mean on the field.” He snapped. “When I was nine years old, I was raped by my babysitter. I didn’t tell anyone for a month, and by then he had left town. I couldn’t go to counseling – too expensive – and I was so fucking terrified all the time. Nine-year-olds shouldn’t want to commit suicide, but hey, I’ve never been one to fit society’s molds. But I had this Iron Man mask, right? Because he’s awesome.”

Senor Grape was staring at him. He had lost his skill of interruption.

“I would put it on all the time, but especially at night, because that’s when the nightmares happened. But Iron Man could fight nightmares, just like he could fight aliens and wormholes. So I would put it on to fight my demons,” Peter swallowed his tears. “Because Peter Parker wasn’t brave. Peter was so scared. But Iron Man was brave, and if Peter was Iron Man, then he wasn’t so scared.”

The teenager took a deep breath. “Listen, I know you’re hurting.”

“You can’t-,”

“Even after everything I’ve just told you, you don’t think I can empathize?” Peter raised a brow. “Really? Okay. Dude, I wake up every morning wanting to kill myself. Not in the Gen Z humor kind of way, but in the ‘that razor on my sink is pretty sharp man today might be the fucking day’ or ‘that gun in Ben’s drawer wouldn’t hurt so badly if I aim it right.’ The kind of thinking that most people would go to counseling too. I walk around like a fucking ghost half the time. Man, when I was sixteen years old I fucking _died_.”

Something about this conversation held everyone spellbound. No one was moving. Not the wounded heroes, not the villain. Not Peter.

“I have panic attacks more than I eat.” He continued. “I have more scars on my arms than I have years and I feel like I’m falling all the time. I can’t breathe sometimes because my chest feels so heavy. I am so scared of people finally seeing me the way I see myself and leaving me.” Peter felt the salt of tears on his tongue.

 “I am a superhero because if I can’t save myself than the least I can do is save other people.”

Senor Grape didn’t seem satisfied with Peter’s rambling, so he shot another wave of mist at the boy. That just pissed him off.

Peter shot webs at the guy’s hands to hold him in place. He slowly walked towards him with confidence and bravery that he didn’t remember having. But only then did he realize that the tiny part of Peter had grown into a beast. A beast of unconquerable size and strength.

“Don’t you get it yet?” he breathed. “You can’t do anything to me. The reason that your powers aren’t working on me is because I face my own worst fear every day. I am so afraid of waking up in the morning, of having to be a _person_ again. but I do it anyway. Because there are people that need me. Because they have panic attacks.” He gestured to the fallen heroes around them. “Because they have PTSD episodes. Because this morning I had to remind the fucking _Winter Soldier_ that it was okay to want to live. Because somewhere in me there is a person that wants to be able to wake up and know that it’s okay to be broken, but that doesn’t make me unlovable.”

He didn’t realize how close he’d gotten to the man until he was a foot away.

He a step away from Peter.

Peter wiped the blood from his chin and grinned. “I have to fight death every day, man. Trust me, compared to the razor in my cupboard, you’re nothing.”

And he clocked him across the face.

Senor Grape collapsed, unmoving.

So did Peter. Collapse that is. He was sobbing though, so very much mobile.

His body shook with the effort of his sobs, making him cling to the earth beneath him. Footsteps thundered across the ground towards him but he barely heard them over his pounding heart. His words came crashing in around him and he couldn’t _breathe god he couldn’t fucking breathe it was all too much_ –

 

“Hey, baby, it’s okay. We’re here. _I’m_ here.”

Tony. That was Tony’s voice.

“It’s Tony, kiddie. It’s Tony. I’m here. I’m not going to let you fall.”

For the first time in a long time, Peter let himself break, trusting that Tony would piece him back together. Trusting that Steve and Bucky and Natasha and May and Bruce and Wanda and Sam and Clint and all the others would help sew him back together.

“I don’t want to feel so sad anymore, Tony.”

Suddenly he was aware of the hand running through his hair, the warm breath at his temple. He was aware of his body being cradled by his dad, by Tony, where he felt the safest. He was aware of Tony’s warmth and the way his other hand was rubbing up and down Peter’s spine to ground him.

It felt like home.

“I know, buddy.”

“I don’t want to hate myself.” He croaked. “I don’t want to have to fight anymore. I just want to feel happy again.”

“Fuck, baby.” Tony grabbed him tighter. The brown dust was turning back into pavement. New York materialized around them once more. The sun had broken through the clouds and hit Peter like a warm hello. “I do too. God, I’m so sorry.”

“Me too.”

“No, honey, you don’t need to be sorry. Pete, Peter, look at me.”

He did. What he saw was unconditional, uninhibited love reflected back at him.

“I love you so much, Peter. So much.”

Tears streamed down his face. “But why?”

“Oh, Peter, because you are the single greatest thing that has ever happened to me.” Tony stroked his cheeks softly ( _home, home, home_ ). “Because your heart is so big. Because you think of others before yourself. Because you don’t have a selfish bone in your body. Because you are clumsy and stupid sometimes. Because you are so good, Peter.”

Peter sobbed harder, leaning into the embrace that he didn’t think he deserved.

But then again, it wasn’t about what he thought. Perhaps it was about what he needed.

“Because you’re my Spiderbaby.” Tony whimpered. “And because I love you. God, Peter, I love you so much. So fucking much. I love you enough for both of us, okay? And I’m going to be here to catch you every single goddamn time you feel like jumping, okay? Because I need my Spiderbaby. And because the world wouldn’t be worth living in if you weren’t in it.”

Peter waited for his mind to supply a contradiction, a snappy reply, a disagreement.

None came.

“Tony?”

“Yes, bubby?” the hand was still in his hair as the world continued to move.

“I love you too.”

The hands squeezed tighter, and Peter believed that maybe, just maybe, he would be okay.

Peter was stained glass and bullet holes. His nights were sleepless and filled with haunted memories and he was so fucking tired.

But stained glass was only beautiful because it was broken.

That’s how the light gets in.

 

            fin


End file.
